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New Poll: Evangelicals Backing Trump

By Daniel Schultz

…up even higher totals. In some ways, you could see 2016 as the Evangelicals-vs.-Nones election. The two groups will approach rough parity as Sanders voters get behind Clinton, however grudgingly. Because the Nones are somewhat more evenly distributed across the nation than evangelicals, a stalemate favors Clinton. It does Trump no good to ring up a super-majority in Mississippi when Clinton can flip North Carolina, for example. My colleague Neil J…

The Religious Case Against Religious Discrimination in Cakeshop Case

By Patrick Hornbeck

…accommodations law.” The Supreme Court has long held, going back to a late-nineteenth-century suit by a Mormon believer who argued that Utah’s prohibition against bigamy threatened his right to practice his faith, that when a law is “generally applicable”—that is, when it doesn’t single out any particular religious group—it is constitutional for such a law to burden some individuals’ religious practices when the government has a compelling intere…

Debunking the Myth That Democracy Is “Incompatible” With Islam

By Asma Afsaruddin

…g no disjunction between religious beliefs and democratic principles. In a number of Muslim-majority countries, the preference was even stronger. In Jordan, for example, 54% of men and 55% of women want Sharia to be the only source of legislation. Interestingly, from a comparative perspective, a 2006 Gallup poll indicated that 46% of Americans say that they want the Bible to be a source of legislation. These findings corroborate earlier studies co…

YOU Are Spiritual But Not Religious: The Secret Spiritual History of the Choose Your Own Adventure Books

By Daniel Silliman

…panzees. Your encounters with these creatures, and with various other ne’er-do-wells, spins the book off into so many directions it’s hard to keep track of them. Depending on which choices you make, the House of Danger houses a counterfeiting ring, a secret organization for international peace, a paranormal hotbed of ghosts left over from the 1887 prison riot, or a spearhead of an alien invasion. Whatever happens, there’s never a dull moment. The…

A Secret History of Satan

By W. Scott Poole

…was a book almost twice as long. My publisher felt, obviously, that a three-hundred-page book would be much more accessible than the almost six hundred pages I envisioned. This means I didn’t get to spend as much time on Satan in American literature as I had hoped (though there are long sections on important figures like Hawthorne and Twain). I think that I probably would have also, in a longer book, spent even more time on folklore, especially ur…

It’s The Apocalypse, Stupid: Understanding Christian Opposition to Obamacare, Civil Rights, New Deal and More

By Daniel Silliman

…ism in the 1960s and the 80s and the 90s and 2010. In 2010, writing as a 91-year-old, he believed this message was one of the most important things he could leave behind on this earth. In this book he says the signs are now clearer than ever. He’s written a lot of books, but five on apocalypticism? I don’t know that he’s covered any other topic in five books. At the same time, I want to be very clear: postwar evangelicalism grew far more diverse t…

The Gospel of Contradiction: An Interview with Mary Gordon

By Nathan Schneider

…suffering or who have caused my suffering, it tends to be the Prodigal Son-types who have alleviated it. My great spiritual ideal is John XXIII. He was a big, roly-poly guy who, while vicar in Turkey, signed fake passports for Jews, allowing them to escape. One of my favorite pictures in the world is of him with a wine glass in one hand and a cigarette in the other. As Pope, he said, “See everything, overlook much, correct a little.” He opened up…

Religious Leaders Need ‘Empty the Pews’ Which Chronicles the Darker Side of the ‘Nones’ Phenomenon

By Kaya Oakes

…ited world view. These often begin with the person remembering the breaking-point moment, then explain how the individual was brought up in a family with strict religious beliefs, followed by a description of the person’s post-faith life. This is certainly not to say that these stories aren’t important or moving, it’s simply to point out that those looking for patterns in the stories of Nones or post-religious adults might look closely at why such…

The Story Behind the Catholic Church’s Stunning Contraception Reversal

By Patricia Miller

…pulating the size of their family for the sake of the family’s overall well-being. So by 1960 the church had made three key admissions: that sexual intercourse within marriage played a role that was not limited to procreation; that it was acceptable to limit family size for a number of reasons; and that it was licit to use the naturally occurring sterile period to do so. Enter Catholic physician John Rock. By designing a contraceptive that used ho…

‘Heretics’ or ‘Atheists’? A Response

By Rachel Ozanne

…become associated, rightly or wrongly, with an especially negative, single-minded person. For instance, when this friend was the teaching assistant for a class on 20th-century American history, the professor emphasized women’s rights and feminism throughout the course. At the end of the semester, the professor asked the students how many of them believed in equal rights for women. Almost the entire class raised their hands. However, when he asked…